Animal Rx: 11 Ways Pets Make You Healthy

Animal Rx: 11 Ways Pets Make You Healthy

Of course you can’t resist your golden retriever’s puppy-dog eyes or your tabby’s silly antics, but you’re getting much more from your pet than unconditional love and great pics for your Facebook wall.

Nearly two-thirds of American households include a pet — and our animal companions are proving themselves adept at enhancing human health in increasingly diverse ways. From calming patients before medical procedures to motivating owners to exercise, pets may be the best medicine we don’t even realize we’re taking.

Dogs Get You to Sweat

Your pooch may be the best fitness trainer around. Dog owners are 41 percent more likely to meet government recommendations for moderate exercise through walking (at least 150 minutes a week at a brisk pace), according to a 2008 Australian study. And strolling with a dog tends to perk up your normal pace, according to research on elderly dog walkers at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Mo.

To turn strolls with your pooch into a workout, aim to move at a pace of at least 3.5 miles per hour, five days a week for 30 minutes at a time, says Mathew Reeves, PhD, associate professor of epidemiology at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Mich. “No stopping at every lamppost,” he says.

Pets Calm Your Blood Pressure

Simply being around your pet can help keep your blood pressure in check, research shows. In one study, pet owners experienced less of a blood pressure spike when they performed a stressful arithmetic task when their pet was in the room — even though they didn’t touch or interact with them.

Exactly how pets lower blood pressure isn’t known, but animals are thought to offer the same kind of bulwark against stress as human pals or spouses, according to the researchers. And unlike social support from humans, they note, a pet’s love is non-judgmental.

Dogs Relieve Anxiety

Does petting your pooch after a long day soothe your frazzled nerves? Research presented at the 2011 meeting of the American Roentgen Ray Society, a radiology organization, shows their impact is even more powerful than you realize. Scientists found that spending 15 minutes with a dog before undergoing an MRI scan lowered patients’ anxiety. Hanging out with a dog also decreased anxiety among kids who were nervous before seeing the dentist, separate research found.

Animals Melt Away Stress

Forget the bath and scented candle: A snuggle with your animal companion may be all you need to stamp out stress. A survey of more than 1,500 Americans ages 14 to 83 found that owning a pet was associated with lower stress levels, according to research from the Delta Society, which promotes the use of service animals.

Interacting with an animal reduces levels of the stress hormone cortisol in as few as five minutes, according to research from Sandra Barker, MD, a professor of psychiatry at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Va. “Whether that’s because of the distraction or the tactile quality, we don’t know yet,” she says.

Pets Limit Loneliness

Nine in 10 pet owners consider their animals to be members of the family, according to data from Petfinder.com. The site also found that more than half of owners report talking to them, and 80 percent of those who believe their pet responds through body language, facial expression, or sound. No wonder having an animal around has been found to make people feel more connected.

Interacting with a dog (even a robotic one) is associated with less loneliness, especially among the elderly, separate studies by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs have found. The “love” hormone oxytocin may also play a role: Levels of this brain chemical increased when dog owners gazed into their pups’ eyes, pet, or played with them, according to a 2008 Japanese study.

Pets Reduce Allergy Risk

Conventional wisdom has it that animals and allergies don’t mix. And while it’s true that the 15 to 30 percent of Americans with allergies to cats or dogs should avoid them, exposure to animals early in life may actually protect children against allergies later.

Allergies and pre-asthmatic symptoms are less common in children who are around pets or farm animals in childhood, studies by the Medical College of Georgia in Augusta, Ga., and Austrian scientists have found.

If you are allergic and just can’t resist keeping company with a pet, allergy shots can help. And while there’s no such thing as a truly hypoallergenic cat or dog, breeds that shed less may be less likely to make you sneeze, according to the American Kennel Club.

Dogs Can Detect Cancer

Afraid of needles? Prostate cancer screening starts with a blood test of PSA, a protein made by the prostate gland (high levels indicate cancer). But thanks to dogs’ well-honed sniffing abilities, a urine test could eventually be developed to check PSA levels. French scientists recently found that a specially trained Belgian Malinois shepherd (a breed prized for its explosive- and drug-detecting skills) could detect compounds associated with cancer in men's urine 91 percent of the time. Cancer cells produce these chemicals when they die, and they are odorless to humans but detectable by dogs, says Jean-Nicholas Cornu, MD, a urologic surgeon who co-authored the study.

But don’t expect Spot to greet you at the doctor’s office. Instead, a machine called an “electronic nose” would do the work of the dog — once scientists zero in on exactly which molecule the shepherd is detecting in men with cancer. “For the moment, the pet does not replace the doctor, but one day we may be able to say the dog may discover new means to detect cancer,” Cornu says.

Cats Can Predict Death

An extraordinary cat named Oscar — one of four feline residents of Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Providence, R.I. — has predicted the deaths of 60 people there, says David Dosa, MD, an assistant professor of medicine and community health at Brown University. “He’s not a people person, but he’ll suddenly sit on the bed and won’t move until the patient dies,” says Dosa, who published a book about the phenomenon called Making Rounds with Oscar.

The 6-year-old kitty may be detecting ketones, sweet-smelling chemicals released by dying cells, Dosa says. “There are times he’s the first to know, so he’s not just responding to the commotion around someone near death,” Dosa says.

While it’s possible that a pet could perform the same feat for a sick family member at home, Dosa advocates animal companionship for the comfort it can offer during an illness more so than during the dying process. “I don’t think Oscar is unique in what he does,” Dosa adds. “He’s just in a place where he can do it over and over again.”

Pets Make Chronic Illness Manageable

Pet owners tend to believe that their pet enhances their health and quality of life. This can be a self-fulfilling prophecy, especially in the face of long-term health conditions such as chronic fatigue syndrome. Pets provide distraction from personal worries over health and also tend to enforce a routine that helps their owners get up in the morning and keeps them moving through the day.

Animals Help You Stay Slim

Maybe it’s because they keep you active or because you sneak half of your meal to them under the table — but whatever the reason, pet owners tend to have less of a problem with being overweight than people who do not have pets, which is good news for the two-thirds of Americans who are overweight or obese.

Pets Keep the Doctor Away

You can do more than just eat an apple a day. Several studies have shown that pet owners have less need to visit the doctor. They are more likely to report being in good health and less likely to schedule appointments for sleep problems, heart concerns, and depression.

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